Given the choice between two theories, always opt for the funnier one.
For the Bill Murray in all of us.
Party-favor women make mince of healthy brains
Tanned legs dance across the hull of a yacht
Parked in full view of chronically dormant wealth
Eyes dilated by excess
And the throbbing hearts of aging, scorned social climbers
Whose embers glow in a discarded pile
Making a mask mainly for the mirror,
Familiar chant sweetly filling my ear—
A couple drops there, a couple drops here,
That scream solitude is something to fear.
Taking my liquid courage to cry,
Beatless, stone-cold heart to belie.
The next best thing to my true friend—
Writing the craft, legend to upend.
At the crest of the city
Lies the now quiet park,
Where Love lost His mind
And nearly killed us both.
I laughed when the vibrant kites spiraled toward my cheek.
As the ladybugs told their jokes
And my sun-steeped limbs danced with the clouds.
I could still taste the bitter, black caps
In the rising majesty of sights and sounds,
Cool water calmed my mild nausea
Tucking me in for an afternoon of sensory delights.
Until I saw it—
His face.
Eyes agape with the shriek of a twisted secret,
Thin, blue rims punctured by the bleak, black caps
Scurrying over the grass with
Vacant abandon.
Disjointed shards of thought
Gushing from a sick-crusted mouth.
And His posture, once familiar,
Now desolate—
A befouled alley strewn with broken glass.
His limbs stiff in self-protection,
Throwing erratic blows to fight
Shifting specters along desultory paths.
“Can’t you see the kites, Love?”
I begged.
“No. It’s all an Inferno,”
He replied with the curdling rip of alienation.
I stood witness to His imagined torture
My fragmented faith walking the razor’s edge between
Hospital and Home,
And looked again into the stormy, dark caps of His eyes
For an answer.
He shot down the hill in terror
To crush His delusions
Under the merciful tires of traffic below.
My body resisted seeping between the verdant blades
And my feet took flight.
Vomit dripping from the picnic blanket
As I finally reached His quaking hand and
Guided our four heavy, labored legs down
Stained sidewalks and steep curbs
Into Our house on the old, familiar street corner.
“You’re going to be fine.”
“I am?”
“You are.”
“I am?”
“Yes, you are. Don’t worry. It will be over soon. I love you so much.”
“I am.”